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Monday, April 17, 2006

American Newspapers

1. The Wall Street Journal is read by the people who run the country.

2. The Washington Post is read by people who think they run the country.

3. The New York Times is read by people who think they should run the country and who are very good at crossword puzzles.

4. USA Today is read by people who think they ought to run the country but don't really understand The New York Times. They do, however, like their statistics shown in pie charts.

5. The Los Angeles Times is read by people who wouldn't mind running the country - if they could find the time -- and if they didn't have to leave Southern California to do it.

6. The Boston Globe is read by people whose parents used to run the country and did a far superior job of it, thank you very much.

7. The New York Daily News is read by people who aren't too sure who's running the country and don't really care as long as they can get a seat on the train.

8. The New York Post is read by people who don't care who's running the country as long as they do something really scandulous, preferably while intoxicated.

9. The Miami Herald is read by people who are running another country but need the baseball scores.

10. The San Francisco Chronicle is read by people who aren't sure there is a country or that anyone is running it; but if so, they oppose all that they stand for. There are occasional exceptions if the leaders are handicapped, minority, feminist, atheist dwarfs who also happen to be illegal aliens from any other country or galaxy provided, of course, that they are not Republicans.

11. The National Enquirer is read by people trapped in line at the grocery store.

HT: My mom.

7 comments:

  1. Anonymous9:34 AM

    Do you get along with anyone? It seems you spend most of your time critizing others?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Please see my World of Good series.

    Also, see my Feline Theocracy series.

    Also, check out my Ferrari post.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous11:04 AM

    The "Boy Scout" post is tainted by writing such things as...
    "Today I give you a story that also defies stereotypes, but one that will not surprise anyone who has been involved with the Boy Scouts.The only time we hear of the Boy Scouts in the news these days is when someone is protesting the fact that they refuse to have gay scoutmasters. Their opponents paint them as a reactionaries in need of enlightenment."

    Why do you feel compelled to slant the story in this manner? It isn't the only time we hear about the Boy Scouts-Only your perception. Why not just present this story without the slant? People don't have to be reminded of controversy to enjoy the story. By doing so you dilute the good, defend the Boy Scouts that don't need defending and only perpetuate animosity rather than "World of Good" as you put it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anon,

    (May I call you Anon?)

    Yes, the post contained a dig at the people who want to change the Boy Scouts to include gay scoutmasters and take away their funding and rights to use public land if they won't.

    I think the Boy Scouts represent a great deal of what is right with America and people who attack them need to find something else to do.

    I listen to the radio a lot. I can't remember the last time I heard a news story about the Boy Scouts that didn't involve the gays. It's possible that it's only my perception, but statistically speaking, it's a pretty hard hypothesis to disprove.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous1:49 PM

    It surprising that "a lot" is considered to be "statistically speaking". A refresher on the definition of statistics might be in order.
    It appears that references are needed to support the purported hypothesis.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Test the hypothesis that the number of news stories involving the boy scouts include the issues with gay scoutmasters is equal to the number not involving them.

    That is, you expect that half of all stories should be about the gays and half not.

    If, after n stories heard on the news, you have n involving gays and 0 not involving gays, you can compute the probability that your hypothesis was true.

    "A lot" refers to the size of n. My guess would be on the order of a dozen stories in the past three years. No, I did not keep a log of radio listening.

    I would expect the score to have been 6-6 gay to non-gay stories. It was 12-0. Off the top of my head, the chance of this happening would be 2^-12, or 1 in 4,096 if the stories were equally likely.

    Yes, "a lot" translates into "statistically speaking."

    ReplyDelete
  7. About two years ago I heard Wesley Pruden (editor of the Washington Times..I think the "Moonies" own them..conservative DC area paper) speaking to the National Press Club on C-SPAN. He did the first three lines of this as a joke (with the crossword puzzle thing left out). The punch line (4th)of his joke went like this:
    "The Washington Times is read by those people who don't want anyone to run the Country."

    ReplyDelete